I was born and raised Catholic. My church was huge beautiful mystical and unknowable. The language spoken I had no clue what it meant but it sounded sweet. The music made my heart soar. The nuns and priests live what looked like a non human life. As a woman born of a woman my place was just to be a mother or a nun--take your choice.
I never had a reason to doubt; therefore, I never had a reason to question. I essentially did what I was told until one day it all stopped working for me.
I had a high nuptial mass, pre canna conferences, posted bans, etc. the whole nine yards. I married a man with the same background. I was 19 and he was 21. Then we moved to San Francisco for him to go to medical school. He began wine, women, and song. I had been taught that was his right. Eventually, he chose to be one of California's first dissolutions. He even wanted to sell our daughter in a private adoption. I had absolutely no power.
My family and my church said that at 26 I was never going to be allowed to remarry and that my sex life was effectively over and that I should now give my all to the church and maintaining the rest of the family. I actually tried and could not do it. I felt a complete failure.
I got so depressed I got black. I believed in nothing, perticularly god and I just wanted out. I did a very planned suicide.
I spent months gathering pills out of everybody's medicine cabinet. A few here and there. Uppers, downers, and all arounders. One night having a significant amount I drove to the top of Mount Tamapais with a bottle of brandy and a pint of half and half. I popped and drank thru the night. I have no idea how long until I was found. I have no memories of much. I do know I spent nine days in a coma. And during that time I died.
At that time I had never heard of a near death experience. For some time I hovered above the body listening to what the doctors and nurses had to say. I was impressed that they had more compassion for me than me. And then suddenly, I was woshed down the tunnel. And I found myself at a river bank with deep waving grass displayed by two silver moons and my grandfather with four other beings. My grandfather told me he was there because he knew I would trust and believe him. This would be my choice, I could get back in the body or cross over the river where there is no going back.
He told me I was halfway thru my karma. That all I had experienced I had chosen and if I choose not to get back in the body I would immediately reincarnate and begin again because this is the agreement that I had selected and chosen and until I completed what I had chosen it was essentially ground hog's day. The idea of doing it again was the worst. I got back in the body.
My grandfather and I also had somewhat of jokes of life because he used to take me for long walks to the cemetery when I was four and he was always telling me my eyes were bigger than my stomach and that I always bit off more than I could chew. He told me my guides told me not to take on so much at once but I insisted.
It was very painful and I was weak for some time. I heard an inner music for exactly one year. I came back both at peace and stupelified. At this point in my life, I had never seriously considered reincarnation anything but primitive beliefs and this experience matched nothing. I suspected I was totally bonkers but I was not nor have I ever been again no matter what suicidal. I would not talk about it to any body for fear of all the things we do to those we decide are crazy.
I stopped studying psychology and started nursing school. Having been healed no matter how strange--I wanted to help heal. I began seeking to understand if I was crazy or blessed or both and what to do about it.
I became a seeker for ten years. Tried all kinds of religions, disciplines, and experiences. Found some value in all of them. After ten years converted to Judaism for the discipline and the intellectualism of the reform movement. I most waved with Jung and Buddhism and they were not exclusive to combining with Judaism.
Through the years, I have had many strange experiences. I have always remained a seeker. I still am and I still have strange experiences.
What I believe is so deep, so personal, so complex and complicated that I have never tried to explain it to any one. I feel that everyone decides the what when where and how of the spiritual journey on his own. I know no one could have told me to go where I have been. Sometimes I think I should have tried to explain to my children what I thought but I did not. I contemplate that a lot now.
I have been told that I am a mystical rational--the epitome of paradox. Through the years I have been told I was a witch, a heretic, a confabulator, etc. All reasons why I really don't want to explain in depth.
I call god the universe which I find becoming more common now. I do think there are spiritual laws that are as important as physical ones. I think they are connected but we don't know or see them all yet. I think one of the biggest problems we have as a society is that none of the world's religions are really working for us as a whole and no one sees anything to replace them. The closest is Buddhism which says go in and find a whole mystical realm.
On youtube is a 45 minute film of Dr. Rick Strassmen's DMT--the Spirit Molecule. It is an interesting way to begin the new year by contemplating something totally different and why this knowledge is so actively suppressed by the status quo.
One of the questions about this 11 years of research is if none of the spiritual knowledge is real but strictly hallucinations why would that evolve universally? If the best way to die is quietly and peacefully why would we have hyper brain activity at death rather than just fading away?
What I will tell you is that being something, even atheist, is more acceptable than being way out of the box in thinking about god--especially in thinking about god. I absolutely believe god exists but encompasses no theology as it exists now. I have no certainty about anything and I am perfectly comfortable with it. It only took me about 30 years to get here.
Had I seen this film--it might have only taken me ten. Happy New Year and a good beginning to all of us at Kos.